


not seeing that loving you, that's what i was trying to do

by shoulderbladesarewings



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Friendship/Love, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Texting, Zayn leaving
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-31
Updated: 2015-03-31
Packaged: 2018-03-20 15:18:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3655179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shoulderbladesarewings/pseuds/shoulderbladesarewings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zayn texts Harry to tell him that he's not coming back</p>
            </blockquote>





	not seeing that loving you, that's what i was trying to do

**Author's Note:**

> Wasn't going to post this after the Twitter drama last night but then I figured what the hell

Harry really believed he was coming back.

   ‘I’ll be gone for two weeks,’ Zayn had told him, giving him back the T-shirt he’d borrowed the night before. ‘A month tops. I just…can’t deal with this anymore.’

   ‘I get it,’ Harry had assured him, before giving him the biggest hug he could.

   He’s been sleeping in that T-shirt ever since, because it smells like him and he misses him so much, even more than the others do. Liam’s sad, sure, but he’s been distant ever since he started dating Sophia. Niall was down for a day or two but as always he bounced back quickly, far too excited to be in a new country meeting new fans and learning new words to worry about Zayn.

   Harry expected that from them – but it’s Louis’s reaction that is the most strange to him. Because he…isn’t reacting at all. He’s behaving totally normally. Brighter, even. They’re all relieved he’s finally broken up with Eleanor and relinquished control of his social media accounts but even so, Harry can’t help finding his happiness to be in poor taste at the present moment in time, the space beside him in their WYMB formation as obvious as the gaping hole in his chest.

   He texts Zayn every day, just to make sure he’s alright, but he never gets a reply. Zayn has a tendency of switching of his phone when he’s trying to detoxify, but Harry still worries about him constantly. Is he eating properly? Is he painting? Is he depending too heavily on drugs? He lies awake at night worrying, and when Louis stirs in the night and opens one bleary eye to find him staring blankly at the ceiling he’ll hold him close and mumble _Go to sleep, Curly. We can’t lose you too._

_We haven’t lost him,_ Harry whispers stubbornly in response. _He’s coming back._

   But today Zayn’s finally texted him, brief and blunt, like a blow to the head. **_I’m sorry. I’m not coming back._**

   Louis’s still asleep, oblivious to the buzz that started Harry awake; impervious to the world shattering around his ears. Not coming back? How can he be not coming back?

   He wants to ring him, but somewhere inside he knows he won’t pick up. He never does, the times he backs out of concerts or award shows or meetings. He says he’s afraid the sound of his voice will force him onto a plane. He’s too choked up to get the words out anyway and so he writes them instead, although they come out stilted and furious because emotion never translates accurately into text. **_What do you mean?_**

   A small pause, and then another text. It’s infuriating how close it makes him feel, like he could reach through the screen and touch him, or at the very least hear his voice. Will it be slurred and blurry with weed and sleep? Will it break apart in his throat like seashells? Or will it be calm, steady, sure? **_I mean I’m out. For good._**

   Harry makes a sound that isn’t a sound. He isn’t even sure if it came from his mouth, or if it’s just the sound of his heart splitting in half. **_Why?_** he writes helplessly, feeling like he’s calling out into a dark, endless void. **_How could you?_**

   A long, long pause. He’s half-expecting an entire essay, but he isn’t really surprised when he gets three words. They are, after all, the hardest words to say. **_I’m so sorry._**

   But they aren’t enough. **_Fuck you. FUCK YOU._**

**_I love you. All of you. You deserve better than me._ **

   No, no, no, he’s not playing that trick, he is not getting away with a chestnut as old and rotting as _it’s not you, it’s me._ Goddamn right it’s him but it’s more than that, it’s all of them, it always has been. What on earth would be the point otherwise? **_You’re not doing this. You can’t do this._**

**_Yes I can. I bought my share of the contract. They released me._ **

**_TO US you can’t do this TO US._** He’s crying, he can feel it, saltwater stinging his sleepy eyes, but he doesn’t care, he has to get through to him, he has to make him see that this is a mistake. **_Whatever it is, whatever’s wrong, we’ll get through it, we’ll help you._**

**_Remember when ‘we’ used to mean me as well?_ **

   He falters, jarred out of his breakdown.

   He’s right. _‘We’_ has meant something different for a long time now.

   _Maybe we should get Zayn into rehab, do you think he’s going too far?_

_Make sure Zayn takes his meds, we can’t afford for him to have a panic attack at the signing._

_I know you’re not together anymore, Liam, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have to look after him._

   Hesitantly, he writes **_We just want to make you better._**

**_This is me making myself better. I have to do this._** Pause. **_Hazza, please let me do this. Please let me go._**

   A sob slips out of the hand Harry’s got pressed to his mouth. Louis groans in his sleep, reaches over to touch his thigh. ‘Harry?’

   Harry turns his phone off. He knows that Zayn will understand why he’s not replying. This is what he wants, what he needs to get better. To be let go. To be left alone. To heal.

   ‘Harry?’ Louis repeats.

   ‘You knew he was leaving, didn’t you?’

   He’s silent for a little while, opening his eyes properly and tightening his grip on Harry’s leg. ‘Yes.’

   ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

   ‘He said if he’d told you before he left you would have convinced him to stay. But he still wanted to tell you himself, just when he was ready.’

   Slow tears slip down Harry’s face. He imagines Zayn packing; imagines his thought process on the last night he sang with them to their fans about love and loss and imperfection; imagines him saying goodbye to Louis. But not to him.

   And yet, he understands. It even warms him a little inside, to know that Zayn attributes that much power to him. To know that if he had begged him not to, he wouldn’t have gone.

   But maybe that kind of power is dangerous. Maybe it’s better this way, on the other side of the world from him, his only connection to him forcefully shut off. Maybe once in a while in life we’re allowed to experience relationships that bind tighter than steel bands and hurt like hell to break – but they have to break, because stories don’t end and people don’t stay set in stone just because a boy called Harry loved a boy called Zayn, second only to his love for the boy beside him now. Maybe this is how it is supposed to be.

   Still, it will be a long time before Harry can sleep through the night again.

   And, if he’s being honest with himself, he’ll never really let Zayn go.


End file.
